But when he shot up from 6-foot-3 to 6-foot-6 in the summer before his junior year of high school, an assistant coach at Andrew Jackson High School in Jacksonville, Fla., encouraged Brown to try out for the basketball team.

Brown had exceptional athleticism. He had played quarterback on the junior varsity football team at both First Coast High School before transferring to Andrew Jackson as a junior. But he knew nothing about basketball.

"It was a learning experience,'' Brown said. "I had to learn how to dribble and shoot. All I did was run and rebound.''

Then Brown learned how to dunk. Almost.

"I was good at almost dunking,'' he said. "If you got points for almost-dunking, I would've had about 30 a game.''

Brown, who is now a 6-8 sophomore at High Point University, has mastered the art of dunking.

Last year, Brown was named the Big South Conference's Freshman of the Year after averaging 16.4 points and 6.1 rebounds per game. In addition, he made ESPN SportsCenter's Top 10 plays on three different occasions for his high-flying dunks.
In his very first college game, Brown threw down a dunk off an alley-oop against UNC Greensboro that was the No. 1 on SportsCenter's Top 10 plays. He caught a cross-court pass with his right hand and rammed in through the net.

Brown happens to be left-handed.

"He does things that you don't have to teach,'' High Point coach Scott Cherry said.

This year Brown is averaging 19.4 points and 8.8 rebounds per game for High Point (3-5), which plays No. 2 Syracuse (10-0) at the Carrier Dome on Friday night. Cherry compares Brown to his former North Carolina teammate George Lynch. Brown may not be a household name just yet, but he's on every NBA scout's radar.

Cherry happened upon Brown by accident on the recruiting trail. He was at an AAU event to watch another prospect.

"He was in the gym playing for one of the other teams,'' Cherry said. "I saw him and liked him, but I didn't know if we had a chance to get him.''

There were two reasons for Cherry to be concerned about getting Brown to come to High Point, a small school with roughly 4,500 undergraduate students located just outside Greensboro, N.C.

First, sitting alongside Cherry at that same AAU tournament were coaches from the University of South Carolina. Cherry knew that High Point would not be able to out-recruit South Carolina for Brown if the SEC school took a liking to the unpolished project.

Second, Brown's academic records were a mess. In his first two years of high school, Brown had not taken a full course load of classes that were necessary to qualify under the NCAA's entrance guidelines.

Brown worked hard to catch up. He transferred to Arlington Country Day for his senior year, but the NCAA stopped accepting credits from ACD. So Brown spent one prep school year at Oldsmar Christian School in Oldsmar, Fla., and then sat out his first year at High Point.

Brown continued to improve on the court. He was named Florida's 1A Player of the Year as a senior, but several schools, including South Carolina, had dropped their recruitment of Brown because of his academics. High Point, though, never wavered.

"Things just worked out in our favor,'' Cherry said.

Brown would return that loyalty. He committed to High Point in December of his senior year. By the end of that season, schools like Arkansas, Missouri and Jacksonville were trying to get back in the picture.

"I was like, are you serious?'' Brown said. "I don't hold grudges, but I was focused on coming here (High Point).''

If Brown had never played organized basketball prior to his junior year of high school, he had never seen the inside of a real weight-room until he got to High Point. Oh, he knew where the weight-room was. He just didn't use it.

"If you brought a weight to me, I would've run away from it,'' Brown said. "When I played football, I didn't lift weights. I would greet the other players by the door with bag of chips in my hand. I'd just watch.''

Brown weighed just 165 when he arrived on the High Point campus in the fall of 2011. Ineligible to play as a freshman, Brown spent his time in the weight room.

"That's when I became attached to lifting,'' Brown said. He's still skinny, but his weight is up to 207 pounds. "I saw that it works.''

On the court, Brown is in perpetual motion.

"His motor is just nonstop,'' Cherry said. "He just works every single possession. He runs the floor in both directions. He'll block a shot at one end and then sprint the floor and get a layup at the other end. He'll get knocked to the floor and get up and hustle to other end and tip the ball away.''

And then there are those highlight reel dunks. In a game against Wake Forest last year, High Point inbounded the ball under its own basket with a lob toward the rim. Brown curled around, caught the ball and flushed it. The dunk was good enough for No. 3 on SportsCenter's Top 10 that night. Yet another fastbreak alley-oop dunk against Eastern Kentucky was No. 4.

Cherry hopes that Brown will get a shot at the NBA. He thinks the 6-8 forward should get a chance.

"I don't throw that (the NBA) out there for just anybody,'' Cherry said. "I'll put him up against anybody they draft one-on-one just because of his non-stop work ethic. I just hope he gets the opportunity to get in a workout with guys.''

Brown takes his coach's praise in stride.

"I appreciate Coach saying it, but he knows that's not going to get in my head,'' Brown said. "It's everyone's goal to go to NBA, but a lot of guys are good enough and they don't make it. I'm thankful for him believing in me, but it's not going to stop me from working hard. I work toward that every day and every night.''